Reality and Role Playing: The Use of a “Living Case Study” in Management Education
| Date | 01 January 1983 |
| Published date | 01 January 1983 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb055469 |
| Pages | 9-16 |
| Author | Steve Linstead,Bob Harris |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour |
Reality and Role Playing:
The Use of a "Living Case Study
in Management Education"
by Steve Linstead, Humberside College of Higher Education
and Bob Harris, Humberside Management Centre
Introduction
This paper describes some of the major elements of
Marfleet Steel Company, a multidisciplinary case study
which we developed with the help of Chris Dixon. The case
attempted to address some of the educational problems
which had arisen from our experiences with the group of
students for whom it was first designed, but which we felt
were typical problems of management education in
general. The paper begins by discussing our own particular
difficulties and their relation to the generalised problems
of the education/experience gap; the common
sense/education distinction; the importance of the un-
conscious in developing managerial "skills"; the need for
integrating disparate disciplines; the difficulties of handl-
ing various and conflicting sources of information and the
indispensability of action and involvement to successful
learning. We go on to discuss our specific objectives and
methodology in developing Marfleet, focusing on issues of
verisimilitude, the provision and release of information
and the importance of role-playing to the "living case
study". We examine the running of the case, with formal
inputs, monitoring the process and providing and organis-
ing feedback. Finally, we discuss the experiences of both
staff and students on the case and suggest that the "living
case study" method, though demanding for all par-
ticipants, offers huge benefits in stimulating discovery and
learning. It makes considerable advances in bridging the
gap between the too often isolationist classroom case study
or simulation and the organisationally problematic action-
learning project.
Background
Education v.
Experience
In a recent survey of part-time DMS students, one of the
respondents, in a general comment, remarked:
(the course) has really presented me with a "menu" of
managerial techniques when perhaps I was seeking an
Egon Ronay or Michelin
guide[1
].
This is a peculiar, but, sadly, not unique, revolt into
Taylorism against the traditionally dominant business-
school model of management education, which is "con-
cerned with high abstraction and specialised techniques"
and tends "to deal with concrete cases and examples under
static and isolated conditions"[2]. The techniques are
presented in isolation from experience—the manager must
choose, but how? Our respondent, in his earnest desire for
the link to be forged between theory and practice, and with
some timidity regarding his own ability to do this, regress-
ed into demanding to be told the "one best way" to
manage.* In the structure and organisation of too many of
our management programmes, the "gap between learning
and doing"[3] is almost inherent, and it is hardly surpris-
ing that many managers view management as a collection
of quantitative methods and specialised techniques for
making logical decisions and solving problems logically,
no matter how inappropriate this may be as a model of
their working lives.**
Integration
Our own experience of the gap between learning and do-
ing, from courses we have followed and courses we have
taught, led us to a number of criticisms of the traditional
"techniques-based" business-school courses. We found
that:
(i) There was a prevalent assumption amongst
students that a course such as the DMS was a
ticket to advancement to be purchased once only.
Having been studied, the subjects were "done"
and had little relevance to the future or present
work situation, and
(ii) In association with this lack of "vertical" integra-
tion, there was a lack of "horizontal" integration
of ideas within the courses, they being left as
"bundles" or "pigeon-holes"[5] within the "box
model" of education. For example, organisational
behaviour was being taught with such an emphasis
on process as to make it seem that commercial
constraints and demands of organisational sur-
vival were suspended or of minimal influence.
Corporate studies and business policy, far from
being integrative, both assumed a stability in
human relationships which implied that they were
either invariable or of no consequence. Building
on a "technique-centred" and "box model" could
at its best yield only the functionalism of a cor-
*Later in the response he replied "This may
well
be indicative of
my
own
lack of confidence as a manager..."[1]
**Sune Carlson demonstrates that although managers have an idea of a
typical day as being one of decision making and application of techni-
ques,
it hardly ever happens although their belief
in
it
is
undimmed[4].
PR 12,1 1983 • 9
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